#!/usr/bin/nawk -f
#
# field - print a field.
#         Written using nawk (Unix/Linux).
#
# 14-Aug-2006, ver 0.80
#
# USAGE:    field fieldnum [file...]
# 
#    eg,
#           ls -l | field 5         # print field 5
#           field 2 data.txt        # print field 2 from "data.txt"
#
# I'm tired of typing awk one-liners to simply print a field. eg, if I
# wanted to print field 6 from an "ls -l" output,
#
#   $ ls -l | awk '{ print $6 }'
#
# No problem, you say. But for something used countless times each day,
# this could be a lot easier to type. With this tool you can use,
#
#   $ ls -l | field 5
#
# I should have written this a long time ago...
#
# COPYRIGHT: Copyright (c) 2006 Brendan Gregg.
#
#  This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
#  modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License
#  as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2
#  of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
#
#  This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
#  but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
#  MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
#  GNU General Public License for more details.
#
#  You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
#  along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation,
#  Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA  02111-1307, USA.
#
#  (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html)
#
# 14-Aug-2006    Brendan Gregg     Created this.

BEGIN {
    if (ARGC < 2) {
        print "USAGE: field fieldnum [file...]"
        print "   eg,"
        print "       ls -l | field 5"
        exit 1
    } else {
        field = ARGV[1]
        ARGC = 1
    }
}

(NF >= field) {
    print $field
}